This was one of those days when nothing seemed to go right. I had driven up the mountain and into the forest in search of interesting things to take pictures of.
If you are naturally a little bit creative, then you will understand when I say that nothing I saw that day worked for me. I have no idea how many images I took - lets just say it was lots. And I was getting quite frustrated with the day, taking pictures of landscapes, mountains, rotting wood, moss covered rocks, and just about anything else I could find. But nothing stirred those creative juices.
By midway through the afternoon I had given up and feeling very dejected, I started the long drive home, hoping that somewhere on that drive I would find the creative spark I needed to save the day. But alas, on arriving home nothing had even come close to firing up my imagination.
So I sat, I had coffee, and I had food. I couldn't even work up the enthusiasm to look at what I had taken because I just knew how terrible the days work had been. So the card sat in my camera on my desk for several days before I next ventured out.
On that next trip I saw the pictures from my last outing, and knowing how bad they were I almost erased the file. But somehow it goes against the grain to destroy your own work, regardless of what you think of it. So I just tagged the new pictures onto the end of the same file.
On getting home that night I processed the days images, one or two of which were reasonable. And then as I was in a better mood, I thought I would at least take a quick look at the preceding days images. You know, just in case - although I didn't really expect to find anything.
As I am scrolling through I passed one image, and then went back to look again. Couldn't quite figure out why I went back to it, so I started scrolling again, only to be pulled back to look at it again.
It sat on my monitor for probably 30 minutes with me just staring at it, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out what the attraction was. It was after all, just a piece of weather beaten wood.
And then suddenly, out of nowhere, it hit me. There he was, a real life Alien, sitting on a bench with his lunch on his lap, sucking down the goodness with his Elephant like trunk.
All that remained after processing was to name the image and that actually came quite easily. I remembered a song from my childhood which had the line "if you go down to the woods today you're sure of a big surprise". I totally don't remember any of the rest of the song except to tell you that I think it was all about Teddy Bears.
Now that I see it, I really like the image. And I guess that is the lesson, to never give up because there is always something in there somewhere.
I hope when you go down to the woods you can find your very own Alien. If you do I would love to see him.
I hope you see him in this picture quicker than I did. If not, try another beer - it loosens up the thought process.
